Top of my reading list this new year is Tom Crewe’s The New Life: a brilliant debut that retells the story of Havelock Ellis and John Addington Symonds, their unconventional marriages and the book they wrote together that set out to change both public opinion and the law on homosexuality. I’ve rarely read a historical novel so thrillingly, vibrantly alive, and I can‘t wait to hear him talk about it at our event on Wednesday 18 January.
Love, Leda by poet Mark Hyatt, an amazing rediscovery from Peninsula Press, follows its gay, working class protagonist through days and nights in the coffee shops, bars and bedsits of 1960s Soho. A remarkable portrait of the era, from a voice rarely heard.
Kathryn Scanlan’s Kick the Latch is a fascinating act of ventriloquism: based on interviews with Sonia, a horse-trainer from the American Midwest, Scanlan creates a completely gripping account of daily life in the strange and insular world of the racetrack.
Also on my list, a couple more debuts to look out for: Jonathan Escoffery's If I Survive You, a series of linked short stories about a Jamaican family in Miami, and Fire Rush by Jacqueline Crooks, a novel set in the underground dub reggae scene in 1980s London; a speculative fiction verse novel by poet-novelist-translator-publisher Jen Calleja; the first novel translated into English from Constance Debré, translated by Holly James; and finally, few new books by authors that I’m always excited to read: Yuri Herrera, Nicole Flattery and Sophie Mackintosh.
From the publisher:
*Shortlist, Debut Fiction, 2023 Nero Book Awards *London, 1894. John and Henry have a vision for a new way of life. But as the Oscar Wilde trial ignites public outcry, everything they long for could be under threat.'Beautifully written'…
From the publisher:
WINNER OF THE GORDON BURN PRIZE 2024 A New Yorker Book of the YearAbout one woman’s fine, hard life at the racetrack, Kick the Latch – with its ruthless concision and artful mysteries – is…
From the publisher:
Foreword by Huw LemmeyNote on author and text by Luke RobertsIt’s mid morning. Cool. Not many coffee bars open. I, the brave one, god of any telephone kiosk, walk down Dean Street, see the man of the day; raincoat, shoulders round,…
From the publisher:
SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2023 BOOKER PRIZE‘Dazzling’ GUARDIAN‘Blistering’ THE TIMES'A delight' DIANA EVANS‘Fiction written at the highest level’ ANN PATCHETT'Hilarious,…
From the publisher:
GRANTA BEST OF YOUNG BRITISH NOVELISTSFrom the Booker Prize-nominated author of The Water Cure comes a chilling new feminist fable based on the true story of an unsolved mystery . . .'A shimmering fever-dream of a…
From the publisher:
Translated by Lisa DillmanThe characters that populate Yuri Herrera’s first collection of stories inhabit imagined futures that reveal the strangeness and instability of the present. Drawing on science fiction, noir, and the…
From the publisher:
Hester Heller is a traitor.Hester Heller is a translator.A muse. A musiker.Hester Heller is inscrutable, even to herself.In a time when looking into the past has become a socially unacceptable and illegal act in the Nation, a group of…
From the publisher:
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION 2023SHORTLISTED FOR THE WATERSTONES DEBUT FICTION PRIZE 2023AN OBSERVER BEST DEBUT NOVEL OF THE YEARIt's time to dance, to love, to be free...'Mesmerising' BERNARDINE EVARISTO, author…
From the publisher:
Translated by Holly JamesA provocative and fierce novel about motherhood, self-discovery and defiance'Destined to become a classic of its kind' Maggie Nelson'One of the most compulsive voices I've read in years' Olivia…
From the publisher:
AN IRISH TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023_______________'A blade-sharp coming-of-age novel' SPECTATOR'Confirms Flattery as a bracingly original writer' IRISH INDEPENDENT'In enviably elegant prose, she manages to be both arch…
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